Changes For New Short Street

19

Changes For New Short Street

    November was not especially wet that year, but very windy, and the knowledgeable were predicting winter gales. Mr Trickett fixed Mrs Lumley’s roof, which had sprung a leak above Dr Adams’s former room, and was paid with most of the small sum that had come to her from her late lodger’s estate. With the remark: “It’s a waste, acos now the room’s empty there ain’t no-one to need the roof sound, only I s’pose if it ain’t fixed it’ll only get worse, and it’s true that a stitch in time saves nine. But you take it, Tim Trickett, I ain’t accepting no charity while I can stand on me own two feet!”

    Timothy Trickett did take it, for it was his livelihood, after all, though not quite sure where, or if, her own two feet came into it. And noted, possibly à propos of the latter: “At least you’ll be able to have another lodger, Mrs Lumley.”

    “Chance’d be a fine thing!” retorted the plump landlady with feeling.

    She wasn’t wrong, reflected Mr Trickett sympathetically. Making an income of any kind was not easy in tiny Waddington-on-Sea, and the lodging-house business was at all times uncertain.

    There then began the saga of Mrs Lumley’s lodgers—the which, frankly, her neighbours up at Number 10 would have considered hilarious, had it not been that they of course wished her to have the income. The first applicant was a Mr Tom Williams, who was fetched home by a very angry Mrs Tom Williams after one and a half days. Next came a Bob Monday, the which gave rise to the following rhyme up the road: “There came Bob Monday, Lasted out the Tuesday, Absconded on the Wednesday, Along with the teaspoons, Bad Bob Monday.” Which, if not brilliant, was certainly accurate. Poor Mrs Lumley, who was very proud of her silver teaspoons, wept buckets. Only to be completely dumbfounded by the arrival of a gentleman caller in a many-caped driving-coat and what she later described to Captain Cutlass as “the shiniest boots in Creation”, who pressed a package into her hand with the kind remark that it was only a trifle but Miss Formby had mentioned she had been distressed over the loss of hers.

    The new teaspoons were discovered to be solid silver and miles fancier than what the old ones had been. And, as Captain Cutlass reported drily to her relatives: “Now she’s afraid to have them in the house, let alone take on another complete stranger as a lodger. But that sort of thing is often the result of the liberal-handed but unthinking charity of the leisured classes, is it not?” In the which sentiment she might not have been incorrect, but Great-Aunty Bouncer’s cross response pretty much summed up the feeling of her audience: “You wash yer mouth out with soap, girl!” Though it must be admitted the phrase “Creation boots” became pretty much daily currency at Number 10, thereafter.

    Unfortunately Captain Quarmby-Vine’s generosity did not solve the problem of the lodger, so poor Mrs Lumley could not look forward to a very merry Christmas.

    The windy November gave way to a wet but mild December—though the Formbys were, really, too busy to notice the weather. It began to seem, as the date of Trottie True’s wedding drew nigh, that Julia was wrong and that the family at Number 10 New Short Street was to go up in the world, willy-nilly. Belinda Formby of course urged them to come over to Blasted Oak House for the entire festive season, an offer against which Julia only managed to hold out to the extent of promising that she, Lash, the old people and the girls would stay on for Christmas after the wedding—though of course Joe and Little Joe could not abandon the shop. Er—and Niners was promised to Miss Henderson, so— But of course Belinda would write Miss Henderson a little note! Niners’s fate seemed sealed: there was no doubt Miss Aitch would be only too thrilled to fall in with anything the chatelaine of Blasted Oak House suggested.

    Ma Mountjoy and Lady Cox did not wait for the actual wedding to shower the family with invitations. Family dinners, larger dinners, little hops for the young people, and card evenings galore. These were, however, the least of it.

    “A dinner at Miss Aitch’s house?” croaked Julia, letting the invitation flutter to the floor. “But she never entertains!”

    “No, only writes menus—or makes Niners and, on that glorious occasion you may recall, Victoria write ’em!” choked Mouse, picking it up. “It is,” she admitted. “All of us.”

    “Count me out!” said Great-Nunky Ben in horror.

    “I wouldn’t mind seeing the house,” admitted Great-Aunty Jicksy on a wistful note.

    “Yes, it does sound lovely,” agreed Mouse.

    “Thought spinster ladies couldn’t invite no gents?” put in Cookie.

    Mouse groaned. “She’s got a host, now, Cookie: Commander Aitch, remember?”

    “Oh, right, so ’e’ll be at the ’ead of the table, eh?” said Mrs Dove, eyeing Lash thoughtfully.

    “In that case, you can count me out, too!” she snapped. “Nothing would persuade me to sit down under the gaze of that granite face in that blamed black silk Belinda forced on me!”

    “Belinda won’t be there, Lash,” said Julia soothingly.

    “As his notions are ten times more ladylike than hers, can it signify?” she snapped, walking out.

    Cookie looked numbly at the half-peeled parsnips she’d abandoned. “Blast.”

    “I’ll do them,” said Mouse quickly, sitting down to them.

    “Ta, deary,” she said numbly. “Ladylike? That tall, dark feller what come to John-John’s wedding? If there’s anything ladylike about ’im yer can call me a Dutchman!”

    “Uh—in his notions, Cookie,” said Julia on a weak note. “Well, he’s been terribly good to John-John and Mary—he put all that lovely sitting-room furniture in for them, you know, and insisted the big bed was a wedding present—but, um, I suppose he is rather correct.”

    “Manners,” said Aunty Bouncer drily. “Don’t think you’ll manage to drag Lash along to this, Julia. And before anyone says it, not going ain’t the way to encourage the man, but then, wasn’t it you what pointed out as ’e is Miss Aitch’s nevvy, Julia? Nothing ain’t gonna come of it, never mind ’ow many Christmases Belinda invites us for, or ’ow many ’ow’s-yer-fathers Ma Cox throws on the strength of Lady Stamforth’s carriage pulling up outside our door, so let’s forget it, hey?”

    “I’m only too willing to forget it,” replied Julia promptly.

    “Me, too,” admitted Aunty Jicksy sadly.

    “I never brung the blamed subject up in me life!” noted Nunky Ben pointedly.

    “All right, I’ll never so much as ’int in front of Mrs Lash again!” cried Cookie with tears in her eyes.

    “Now look what you’ve done!” said Julia exasperatedly to her husband’s aunt. She put her arm round Cookie. “No-one was getting at you, Cookie, dearest.”

    “’E is a fine-looking feller!” she sobbed. “And I only want ’er to ’ave a nice ’usband!”

    “Yes, of course; we all do. Take my handkerchief,” said Julia soothingly. “Get her a cup of tea with a spoonful of rum, one of you useless lot!” she snarled.

    Jumping, they hopped to it, and soon Cookie was sitting comfortably at the table sipping, and admitting that she didn’t know what had come over her.

    … “I thought Lash loathed the man,” said Joe dazedly to his wife’s report that night.

    “You men are blind!” she retorted fiercely.

    Joe swallowed. All right, he was blind.

    Doubtless to the gratification of Ma Mountjoy, the Formbys of New Short Street were favoured the very next day by a visit from Lady Stamforth, with Miss Benedict, Miss Baldaya, and an extremely excited Miss Jack in tow. Mouse took smiling charge of the last and she was allowed to visit the kitchen, and after suitable refreshment they, Captain Cutlass, Mina and Rita all sallied forth into the town. Lady Stamforth did not raise any objections to the young ladies in her charge visiting a dingy curiosity shop with the promise of dropping in afterwards at the Formbys’ printing and binding establishment, so Julia didn’t, either.

    Immediately the girls had departed Lady Stamforth said to Julia, Lash and the aunties with a moue: “Would you believe, your young connection Johnny Formby ees paying attentions to Rita again, and hees friend Jean de la Plante, who I might add has ignored her for three Seasons past, ees paying court to Mina!“

    “So Johnny is back again?” replied Julia weakly to this intelligence.

    “Yes; hees treep to Craigie Castle resulted een the double discovery that Lord and Lady Ivo have promised the youngest MacInnes girl to a well-off Scotsman, and that Lady Serena March ees about to contract an engagement weeth pretty Bobby Cantrell-Sprague—her fortune, my dears, and hees connections. And to theenk at one point we actually believed he felt something for our dear leetle friend Peg Buffitt!”

    A short silence followed this speech. Then Bouncer managed: “We get it, me Lady—except why should this Lord and Lady Ivo have the right to dispose of a MacInnes girl?”

    “Oh!” she said with a gurgle of laughter. “I do beg your pardon, dear Mrs Peters! MacInnes ees the family name, you see!”

    “Ignore Aunty Bouncer, Lady Stamforth,” said Lash with her warm smile. “She says that sort of thing on purpose.”

    “Oh, ho!” she replied merrily. “Testing one’s mettle! I do the vairy theeng myself!”

    “I believe yer,” admitted Bouncer. “Well, none of us was that struck by Johnny, and I dessay ’is Froggy friend’s another of the same, fancy pantaloons an’ all, but in your terms, would they be bad matches for the girls?”

    Nan sighed. “Rita does not care for Johnny: she has far too much intelligence to judge a man by his looks alone. And Mina frankly despises M. de la Plante. Hees family lost everytheeng een the Terror and he has lived all hees life on hees connections.”

    “Ain’t that what’s expected of a well-born young Froggy, though?” returned the redoubtable Mrs Peters.

    “That ees so vairy true, Mrs Peters, and eet does seem a leetle unfair to condemn heem merely for accepting the standards of the class eento which he was born—but you see, Mina expects a man to make something of heemself.”

    “Good for ’er!” contributed Aunty Jicksy firmly.

    “Well, yes, Mrs Huggins, I do so agree. But I—I don’t seem to be able to find anybody for her whom she may both respect and—and like,” she ended on a dismal note. “Well, I shall take the girls up to town next Season, but I do not expect much to come of eet.”

    … “What was that all about?” said Aunty Bouncer feebly once the twitching parlour curtains next-door had ascertained the guests had taken their departure.

    Julia smiled. “Dearest Aunty Bouncer, it was because little Jack had begged for the treat!”

    Jicksy eyed her peer drily. “Stuck out a mile,” she agreed with satisfaction.

    Bouncer smiled feebly. They weren’t wrong as far it went, and, castle or not, there probably wasn’t much for the Vane family to do in this part of the world at this time of year, but… Well, it had just seemed a bit odd, that was all. Her Ladyship had seemed strangely keen for her girls to visit the shop, hadn't she? After the episode of Cookie’s burst of tears, however, she did not venture to voice her doubts. Least said, soonest mended.

    “So they had the wedding reception at Blasted Oak House, eh?” said Sir Harry as he and Captain Cutlass jogged out companionably together behind Donkey Oatee on a frosty January morning, having met by pure coincidence as a consequence of his having paused for refreshment at the little tavern in Lasset Halt the very morning on which she was escaping from the stifling respectability of her cousins’ hospitality.

    “Yes,” she said with a sigh. “Diabolical, I think is the only word, Mr Smith.”

    His broad shoulders shook. “Aye! Well—devilish? Hellish?”

    “Infernal!” agreed Captain Cutlass with a choke of laughter.

    “Abysmal,” he suggested, straight-faced.

    “As in pertaining to the lowest circle of the infernal abyss? Certainly!”

    Grinning, he patted her knee. “Aye. Family get-togethers are always like that.”

    “Ours are not, when it’s just us,” said Captain Cutlass with a sigh.

    “Then you’re damned lucky, me dear!”

    “Was it pretty bad, sir?” asked Captain Cutlass kindly.

    At Yuletide Sir Harry had been forcibly fetched from Little Lasset by Paul and the Ainsley Manor carriage—though he had not, of course, described it in those terms to Miss Calpurnia. “Aye. Nagging. Well, there was Cousin Patty—we were brought up together, me dear, her parents died young—and me daughter-in-law… Oh, well. Me son’s moved on, like he said he would. Have to move meself, can’t afford to hire the house.”

    “I see,” she agreed sadly. “I shall miss you and dear little Donkey Oatee.”

    “Might look for a place in the town.”

    “Really?” she cried, her face lighting up. “I’m so glad! Though you will miss your relatives, of course.”

    “Aye, well, gone back to where they used to live. I’ve had enough of the dump,” he explained, omitting the Iberian theme entirely.

    “I see.”

    “Well, me youngest daughter’s due to come back from India fairly soon, too.”

    “Of course! The one that married a soldier!” she beamed.

    “Yes,” he agreed, omitting Major Hall’s distinguished military career entirely. “Haven’t seen her for years.”

    “Perhaps you could live with them!” beamed Captain Cutlass.

    It was not outside the bounds of possibility. Bunch was certainly not as narrow-minded as her twin. Though Sir Harry was not perfectly sure that he could support on a daily basis the strong dose of common sense which had always characterised her. Agreeing comfortably that he would wait and see, he enquired amiably after her other news, and was momentarily silenced by the description of Lady Stamforth’s arrival at Number 10 New Short Street in full panoply.

    “And are you going back home soon, me dear?” he said kindly.

    “Yes, thank goodness! We have only two more days at Blasted Oak House!”

    That decided it, then: he'd move out of Little Lasset forthwith. “That’s good,” he said cheerfully.

    Cookie opened the front door to the view of a burly, blue-chinned fellow with a patch over one eye. “The family ain’t ’ome yet,” she said cautiously.

    “Expected, though, ain’t they?” he replied cheerfully.

    “Might be. What’s it to yer?”

    He sniffed slightly. “’Er Ladyship sent me down with these. Bit of a treat. Would you be Mrs Dove?”

    “What ladyship?” returned Mrs Dove suspiciously to this gambit.

    “Lady Stamforth, ’oo else? And if you ain’t Mrs Dove, I got the wrong ’ouse— ’Old on!” he said in horror. “Your mistress’s name ain’t Mountjoy, is it?”

    “No!” replied Cookie with a startled laugh. “Bless you, I’d sooner cut me throat than work for ’er! Well, I am Mrs Dove, and I s’pose you’re from the castle, but I’ll just take a look at what yer got, there.”

    Saying nothing, the blue-chinned one held out his basket. Mrs Dove investigated cautiously. “Gawdelpus! What’s these?”

    “Don’t rightly know,” he admitted. “Well, I’ve ate ’em. Spicy. She let them blackamoors of ’ers make ’em. Told me to make sure as you got them, Mrs Dove.”

    Cookie gave in. “Yer better come in. –And wipe yer boots!” she added, rallying slightly.

    Removing his battered hat to reveal the usual spotted kerchief, Mr Poulter wiped his boots meekly and came in. In the kitchen, Cookie having explained that this here was Mrs Lumley, from Number 3, up the road, he happily introduced himself and accepted an invitation to sit down, placing his basket on the table.

    “Just you wait, Mrs Lumley,” warned Cookie as he began to unveil its contents. “Made by the blackamoors from up the castle, this lot is!”

    “Bless us! And do you eat ’em ’ot or cold, Mr Poulter?” asked Mrs Lumley cautiously.

    “Dunno as I could say, Mrs Lumley. Lessee… Think them little savoury things—sort of like pies, ain’t they?—think they generally eat ’em ’ot, though I’ve seen ’em eat ’em cold. Them little coloured ones, they’re all sweetmeats.”

    To this Cookie replied she wasn’t that dim, thanks, but did Mr Poulter realise these ’ere little pie-things ’ad been fried? Mr Poulter just looked blank, so Cookie decided she’d best pop ’em in the oven to warm over.

    “But what they got in ’em, Mr Poulter?” asked Mrs Lumley in amaze, sniffing one.

    “Don’t ask me, Mrs Lumley, ma’am, acos them blackamoors of ’er Ladyship’s, they don’t call nothink by its right name! –Drive yer mad,” he noted. “But I can tell yer it ain’t meat, like a Christian pie, that’s for certain-sure!”

    This conversation subsequently being reported to the family verbatim, Captain Cutlass, in a very good mood at having escaped the stultifying gentility of Blasted Oak House’s hospitality at last, merrily dubbed them “heathen pies,” and the little savoury packets from the castle entered into Formby family folklore under that name from that instant on.

    February blew in on gusts of icy sleet and the sympathetic Mr Poulter, who in the wake of the heathen pies had been seen pretty frequently in the environs of Mrs Dove’s kitchen, perceiving that some time had gone by without Mrs Lumley’s receiving any more applicants for board and lodging, then produced a pair.

    “Black eethings!” reported Captain Cutlass with glee.

    “Very funny,” warned Great-Aunty Bouncer.

    “They’re a pair of spare footmen what ’er Ladyship’s sister didn’t need up in town, what come from ’er late ma-in-law, what ’ad been in India,” said Mrs Dove on an annoyed note.

    “I know, Cookie, but why cannot they do footman for her Ladyship? She already has a bunch of Black eethings, can two more make a difference?”

    Glaring, Cookie retorted: “Do I know?”

    Mrs Huggins at this gave a smothered titter which she tried unconvincingly to turn into a cough and Mrs Peters noted to the ambient air: “Dunno ’oo else would. Though mind you, I never saw a feller what looked less like a viscount’s gentleman’s gentleman.”

    “’E is!” she snapped. “Been with ’is Lordship since ’e were an Army officer fighting the blamed Froggies!”

    The company exchanged glances but made no comment, and Mrs Huggins noted peaceably: “Well, I dessay these blackamoors’ll have to eat like any other critter; no reason why they shouldn’t suit.”

    But alas, in this supposition Great-Aunty Jicksy was utterly and completely wrong.

    “They won’t eat!” sobbed Mrs Lumley, mopping at her eyes with the skirt of her apron.

    “Don’t cry,” said Captain Cutlass kindly. “What happened, exactly?”

    “They didn’t want no supper—well, I didn’t think nothing of it, deary, thought they were tired after their journey. Then this morning they wouldn’t go near their breakfasses: black pudding, it were, with a real nice rasher or two of bacon and fried bread what I done special! And pumped some water for theirselves, and wouldn’t even touch their pot o’ tea!”

    “And at midday?’

    “They wouldn’t touch a crumb!” she wailed, bursting into renewed sobs. “And I said what was wrong and they said nothing, and they kept calling me something funny, like mum and sir together! And it was little meat pies, like what I used to do for Dr Adams!”

    “Ye-es,” she said slowly. At this point it dawned that Number 3’s kitchen, apart from Mrs Lumley’s lamentations, was unusually silent. “Where’s Rosie?”

    “Taken ’em out to buy dried peas, and don’t look at me!” she said wildly.

    “Oh! I see!”

    Sniffling dolefully, Mrs Lumley reported: “I said there’s the bacon bone, if they fancies a nice pea soup, and the little fat one, ’e clapped ’is hands over his ears and rushed out, yelling in Eething!”

    “Mm,” she said, biting her lip. Well, if they were Hindoos, they would not eat meat, and that sounded as if her vague recollection that that was one of the religions that considered the pig an unclean animal was correct. “Dear Mrs Lumley, I think they must be vegetarians.”

    “Eh?” replied the landlady simply, sniffing.

    “That means they don’t eat meat. Um, Mrs Lumley, were those your little beef pies?”

    “Of course, deary!” she said, brightening. “Would yer like one? I can pop it in the oven, it’ll be warm in a trice!”

    “No, thank you very much, but I’ve eaten,” replied Captain Cutlass nicely. “Mrs Lumley, this will be very hard to understand, but—but it sounds to me as if their religion forbids them to eat any kind of meat or—or anything that comes from an animal, like black pudding.”

    Mrs Lumley stared at her in bewilderment.

    “That,” said Captain Cutlass, swallowing, as her mind formed the horridly over-simplified and pejorative explanation, “is what heathens do, you see.”

    “Land’s sakes,” she said numbly.

    “Mm,” she said, putting a warm little hand over the landlady’s two large, damp, distressed red ones that were rolling up the apron.

    A tear slid down the plump, red cheek and she said shakily: “What am I gonna do, deary? I can’t cope with lodgers what don’t eat!”

    It would be less work for her, of course—but no, Captain Cutlass didn’t think she could. And if they didn’t pay for board, only lodging— No. “Mr Poulter meant well, but it’s the wrong thing. I’ll write to Lady Stamforth straight away. And in the meantime… Well, even heathens have to eat: they’ll want to cook for themselves, you see.”

    “In my kitchen?” she gasped.

    Well, possibly, if it wasn’t deemed unclean. “In the fireplace in their room, perhaps.”

    “But it ain’t got a hook nor nothing!” she gasped.

    “No. Look, Mr Hartshorne’s little house is standing empty: he’s moved into the farmhouse with John-John and Mary. They could go there until Lady Stamforth decides what to do about them. Um, did Mr Poulter indicate, Mrs Lumley,” she ventured, “that this was his idea, or her Ladyship’s?”

    “Well—well, I dunno, Captain Cutlass, deary,” she faltered.

    “No.” Captain Cutlass got up. “I’ll ask Commander Henderson if they can use the house.”

    “But ain’t ’e out there with John-John, lovey?”

    “Probably, but I’ll check with Miss Henderson first.”

    “But—”

    But Captain Cutlass, depositing a kiss on her fat red cheek and telling her not to worry, had run out.

    The fancy footman of course answered Miss Aitch’s door and looked down his nose as she asked if the Commander were in. Captain Cutlass was about to give him a piece of her mind—stout-hearted though she was, she was rather worked up at the idea of having to face Miss Aitch and then order the Commander to let a pair of unknown heathens use the house he owned—but a cool voice said from the hinterland: “If that is one of Miss Formby’s sisters, James, I suggest you admit her to the house instantly.”

    Captain Cutlass came in and thanked the Commander somewhat disjointedly, then countering his kind invitation to come into the sitting-room with the suggestion she speak to him out in the hall. Unmoved, the Commander replied that that would not do, and ushered her in.

    “My aunt and Miss Elizabeth are out,” he said, “which possibly explains James’s reluctance to admit you. But as I am old enough to be your father, I don’t feel that the matter is of concern, do you?”

    “What? Oh! Speaking to you alone in your aunt’s sitting-room? No!” said Captain Cutlass with a laugh. “It is lovely, isn’t it?” she added, looking around with approbation.

    “Yes, my aunt has exquisite taste. Please, Miss Calpurnia, tell me what the matter is.”

    Forthwith Captain Cutlass broached her business.

    As a consequence Mrs Lumley was again gratified by the appearance on her doorstep of a gentleman caller.

    “In ’is great ’at!” she explained fervently in Mrs Dove’s kitchen.

    “Ah! Seen that!” agreed Bouncer.

    “What about ’is Creation boots?” asked Jicksy on a sly note.

    “Well, ’e was in boots, aye, Mrs ’Uggins, deary,” allowed Mrs Lumley, rather puzzled. “A real gennelman.”

    Shaking slightly, Jicksy acknowledged it sounded as if he were.

    “And took the eethings off straight away, bag and baggage!” said Mrs Lumley with a great sigh.

    “What, himself?” said Mrs Peters on a weak note.

    “Right! In person! And said to me as it were very well done of Miss Calpurnia!”

    “Let ’er carry something, did ’e?” asked Bouncer, getting her second wind.

    “No need to, acos ’e ’ad a carriage!” she said triumphantly.

    The company gulped, and was reduced to silence.

    “Ah!” said Mrs Lumley, very pleased. “And yer never seen nothing like the way ’e ’anded Captain Cutlass up into it!”

    “Well, we have seen Captain Q-V. a-handing of Trottie True,” mentioned Mrs Huggins.

    Mrs Lumley sniffed slightly. “Dessay.” She heaved herself to her feet. “And said to me while she nipped upstairs to ’em that Captain Cutlass was a girl of great good sense as well a feeling ’eart! There!” On this triumphant note, she thanked them kindly for the cup of tea and went on her way.

    Captain Cutlass’s efforts having been fully approved by the family over the dinner table that night, Mrs Peters, as she herself later recognised sourly, then went and stuck her great boot in her mouth.

    “Seems Commander Aitch thinks very highly of you, Captain Cutlass!”

    “I asked him what I had to, and he is the sort of man who prefers people who speak their piece,” said Captain Cutlass calmly.

    “Aye… Mrs Lumley seemed to think he was quite struck.”

    Captain Cutlass laughed and got up. “Mrs Lumley is well-meaning, but partial—added to which, as well as looking like one of those comfortable, fluffy red hens, she’s got its brain, I fear! –Excuse me, please, Ma, I’ve just realised that I’ve mistranslated a whole paragraph.”

    “She may be a hen, but she’s buried one more husband than what you ’ave, girl!” snapped Great-Aunty Bouncer, reddening.

    Captain Cutlass just laughed and went out.

    “There could be something in it, nevertheless,” said Julia slowly. “I noticed him speaking nicely to her at John-John and Mary’s wedding.”

    “His face didn’t crack when ’e smiled at her, no,” conceded Mrs Huggins, eyeing her peer thoughtfully.

    Lash got up suddenly. “Then the Almighty must have been looking kindly on John-John and Mary, for I’m sure that was a miracle! I’ve buried two husbands to your and Mrs Lumley’s one, Aunty Bouncer, and in my opinion the man despises us all for a pack of small-town petty-bourgeois! And his responding to Captain Cutlass’s request for aid was merely another demonstration of his inability not to do the gentlemanly thing!”

    The family watched numbly as she hurried out.

    Nunky Ben recovered himself first and grabbed her scarce-touched slice of apple pie. Feebly Julia passed him the cream jug.

    “Well, ’e ain’t pretty like the late Diver, but he is a fine, tall figure of a man, Julia, dear,” noted Aunty Jicksy.

    “What?” she said, jumping. “Oh! Yes! And I know she reacted very strongly the day poor Cookie cried—the day we got Miss Aitch’s blamed invitation.”

    There was a short silence, during which certain people had time to recall what else had been said the day Cookie cried.

    Julia took a deep breath. “Lash is clearly much struck, but she is convinced Commander Aitch despises us. And I thought some of us had agreed not to raise the topic again?”

    There was another silence at the Formby dinner-table. Then Aunty Jicksy noted: “Added to which, if Bouncer’s got it right, it’s Captain Cutlass that’s the one ’e favours, if any, not Lash.”

    Joe plunged into the fray. “There’s no point in hashing it over. If these things are meant to be, they’ll be. And God knows I’d give him the lot of you for his hareem for saving John-John’s life! –Willingly,” he noted pointedly as his wife opened her mouth. “That is the fourth slice of apple pie Nunky Ben’s got away with,” he added mildly. “And a half-pint of cream, by my reckoning.”

    Julia came to and snatched the cream jug away, but Joe didn’t deceive himself that that’d be the last of it. Whether or not the Commander fancied any of ’em—and if you asked him, he didn’t. Apart from collecting John-John to go out to Wardle Heights the man had never paid a call at the house in his life—but try telling them that! Women!

    Commander Henderson’s good offices had not, of course, solved the problem of Mrs Lumley’s lodger. As, indeed, Captain Cutlass informed Mr Rattle and Mr Smith. –Sir Harry had little in common with the old sailor except an optimistic temperament, some knowledge of the Channel and the Bay of Biscay, and the experience of a sufficiently variegated history—but they had hit it off immediately at their first meeting, nearly a year since, and the donkey-cart had become quite a frequent visitor to the upturned boat with the brazier. Though whether Mr Rattle had spotted that the soi-disant “Mr Smith” was a member of the gentry would have been very hard to say.

    “Weren’t there a young feller as was a-going to clerk for Mr Crabtree?” asked that worthy.

    “Yes. It fell through,” explained Captain Cutlass. “His mother came round, took one look at him goggling at Rosie Kettle and her goggling back, and whisked him away. She’s put him with Miss Pickles.”

    Mr Rattle went into a shaking, wheezing fit, having to remove his pipe, it was so bad.

    “I’m sorry: you don’t know them, sir,” said Captain Cutlass to Mr Smith with a grin.

    “Don’t think I have to, now! Comfortable-lookin’ sort of woman, Mrs Lumley. Can she cook?”

    “Not a Hindoo vegetable curry, no! But yes, of course she can, she is an excellent cook. And that, you know. was largely the trouble with the eethings,” she added slowly.

    “Right,” agreed Mr Rattle, carefully applying a fresh coal from the brazier to the pipe.

    “Not just that,” she said, smiling at him. “No, she is the sort of woman who cannot feel that her life has a focus or a purpose, I think it is not putting it too strongly, unless she be feeding her household.”

    “Aye: very common indeed, especially in that walk of life. Dare say it goes back to the most primitive mother-instinct,” agreed Sir Harry.

    “Nourishing her children? Good gracious! I think you are quite correct, sir!” she beamed.

    “Ah. Nature, that be, Cap’n Cutlass,” agreed Mr Rattle.

    “Exactly! Well, poor Mrs Lumley needs a lodger she can cook for, both for her emotional well-being and her purse, and I wish to goodness I could find one for her!”

    “Dare say I could try it for a while,” offered Sir Harry casually.

    “She would leap you at you, frankly, sir!”

    “Right; I’ll speak to her. There’s Don Quijote, mind. She got a shed or anything?”

    Captain Cutlass’s face fell. “No: most of those houses have small back yards but you can’t get to them from the street. –Wait! I know! You could stable him with Old Horse, that’s only five minutes’ walk away!”

    Agreeing to this, Sir Harry noted there was no time like the present, and, Mr Rattle having refused a kind invitation to accompany them with the remark that the woman was a ’en that thought a man should be stuffing indoors all his life, they set off.

    “Ah,” said Mr Rattle thoughtfully to his brazier.

    Mrs Lumley was astonished but overjoyed to have Mr Smith as her new lodger, and Joe Formby didn’t mind if an old codger stabled his donkey with Old Horse; and Old Horse, far from objecting to the arrangement, seemed actually to like the little creature—so that was all right. And so the false Mr Smith settled in very comfortably in old Dr Adams’s former room.

    Late February was producing the predicted wild, icy gales, so it was just as well that Captain Cutlass and Mouse had got out in his Lordship’s chestnut woods last year, wasn’t it? Because there was nothing like a dozen or so hot chestnuts in front of the fire on a chilly, blowy night—unless it was hot chestnuts plus a jug of hot, spiced ale!

    The ladies, though accepting sips of the mixture and not averse to a few chestnuts, retired to bed leaving the gentlemen to it, and Little Joe, scientifically applying the poker as his father refilled the jug, noting: “We’ll split it, Nunky Ben’s nodded off,” said casually: “Saw that new lodger of Mrs Lumley’s down near the lifeboat this morning, Pa.”

    Both Little Joe and his father were members of the volunteer Waddington-on-Sea lifeboat crew, though these days Joe generally left the strenuous exercise to his son. Little Joe had been down there checking that the boat was fit for sea. He had already given a full report on this, so his father merely responded mildly: “Smith? What was he doing down there?”

    “Just looking—said he likes being by the sea, grew up in an inland town.”

    “Uh-huh.”

    Little Joe cleared his throat. “He ain’t no Dr Adams, you know, Pa.”

    Joe eyed him tolerantly. “I do know he’s doing the woman, Little Joe!”

    Little Joe gulped. “Aye.”

    “Good luck to ’em,” said Joe mildly. “Old Adams never did her no good, even when he first come to stay, dried-up old woman that he was.” He looked at his son’s face. “I dare say they are both over fifty—well, Smith’d be over sixty—but it doesn’t necessarily wear off entirely as the hair whitens, y’know!”

    “No,” he said weakly. “Um, but does Captain Cutlass know?”

    Joe scratched his chin. “She doesn’t own either of ’em. If she’s silly enough to be shocked, she’ll just have to get over it.”

    “Um, ye-es… Should someone talk to her, though, Pa?”

    Joe gave him a dry look. “If by someone you mean me, no. If you’re concerned, Little Joe, do it yourself: take some responsibility for once in your life!”

    His son blinked. “All right, I will!”

    Joe didn’t think it’d happen, once the effect of the spiced ale wore off, but to his surprise, it did.

    Captain Cutlass went red, and was obviously surprised at her brother’s information, but to his relief seemed neither shocked nor annoyed.

    “Um, you can’t expect things to—to always stay the same or—or to go back to what they were,” ventured Little Joe.

    “No, of course! I’m not upset, it’s just a—a surprise!” she said, smiling at him. “Good gracious, Mrs Lumley with a beau! It’s certainly a change for New Short Street!”

    A change and a half. Though admittedly the mountains had not moved: the man wasn’t doing Ma Mountjoy! Little Joe went off to work, grinning.

    The sapient Mrs Peters and Mrs Huggins, observing the increasing number of visits paid to their kitchen by the one-eyed, burly Mr Poulter, privily admitted to each other that Mrs Lumley’s live-in lover was not the only change to be expected in the emotional life of New Short Street in the near future—but sufficient unto the day! And there was no guarantee he’d marry Mrs Dove or carry her off to the castle, after all. Either or, as Bouncer put it.

    And with only these minor changes, life in New Short Street continued on placidly into the freezing cold winter.

    On the very last day of February a ship struck the treacherous reef to the east of the harbour mouth in broad daylight and the lifeboat was immediately called into service. Little Joe had gone to Brighton on business for the firm, so Joe hurried down to take his place. There was a terrific sea, and the ship could be observed dashing herself to pieces on the rocks. A boat was launched from the ship but the current was against her: the sailors lost control and the boat upturned and splintered. The lifeboat pulled out strongly, and with the experienced Waddington-on-Sea men aboard, it began to look as if the sailors would be pulled to safety, even though the seas did not abate: oars were shipped, men bent over the side to grasp at the flailing arms—

    “Look out!” shouted Mr Rattle from the tiller as a great hunk of timber came crashing towards the lifeboat.

    Too late: the board struck Joe Formby, leaning far out over the side, a crashing blow to the head, rebounded and broke Bob Bodger’s arm, and the drowning sailor went down.

    They brought Joe Formby’s body home to New Short Street at three-thirty of the afternoon, to an accompaniment of dead silence from the white-faced onlookers.

    Mr Rattle’s gruff assurance that it had been quick as lightning was not very much comfort to his stunned family.

    … “I can’t believe it!” sobbed Mrs Lumley that evening in her warm kitchen, as her new live-in lover put a consoling arm round her plump shoulders and Rosie Kettle, for once stunned speechless, just looked on numbly. “Joe Formby! What’ll the family do without ’im? And ’im and Julia, they been together since they were lad and lass! ’Ow’s she a-gonna go on?”

    “Aye, it’s a bad business. Take a sip of this, Mrs Lumley.” –The conventions were observed between landlady and lodger, whatever might have gone on upstairs. Or sometimes in the kitchen itself, if Rosie was safely out at the market.

    Mrs Lumley took a good sip, not recognising the contents of Mr Smith’s flask to be fine Cognac, but would not be consoled. “Acos you expecks it when a feller’s in the Navy, but ’e weren’t! And their John-John come ’ome safe from sea, and Trottie True and ’im both married and two babies on the way what their grandpa won’t never see! It ain’t fair, that’s what!”

    Sir Harry’s generous mouth tightened at this echo of Luís’s reaction to the doctor’s report on poor Inez—the more so since a letter had recently come from Spain, addressed care of Luís’s man of business, saying that although the winter had so far been very mild, she was very much weaker. “No: life is not fair,” he agreed on a grim note.

    Strangely, this philosophical reflection appeared to comfort Mrs Lumley somewhat, for she sniffed hard, blew her nose and concluded: “New Short Street just won’t be the same without Joe Formby.”

Next chapter:

https://thefortunateformbys.blogspot.com/2023/10/new-short-street-without-joe-formby.html